WILLOW-WARBLER, WOOD-WARBLER, CHIFFCHAFF 61 



not the case, its song would at once serve to remove any hesitation as 

 to the bird's identity. It has been described by Gilbert White as a 

 " sibilous shivering noise in the tops of tall woods," the final notes 

 being accompanied by a sympathetic shivering of the wings. The bird 

 then looks as if it were trembling with emotion, as if it were seeking 

 to free its inmost aspirations in streams of harmony, and could not. 

 A tragic spectacle of fettered genius. In its soul a symphony, but 

 in its throat a sibilous, shivering noise. And yet, if more closely 

 watched, the wood-wren seems well content; it sings, peers up to 

 some leaf, hovers beneath it on misty wings, picks off a grub, alights 

 upon a twig, swallows its grub, sings, then eats, then flits, and so 

 wanders through the foliage, rejoicing in its shivering notes and 

 shivering wings, rejoicing in its grubs, and rejoicing in judicious 

 alternation of its joys. The wood-wren is the embodied spirit of the 

 leafy tops ; it is leaf made bird, and its song is the voice of leaves, 

 pleasing as such, and nothing more. 



The full song of the wood-wren, above described, has been 

 syllabled "wheeou, wheeou, wheeou, ip, sip, sipp, sipsip, sipsipp, srr$&$l&? 

 Generally the latter part alone is uttered, and occasionally only the 

 first three loud clear "wheeous." 1 The fact that the two parts are 

 usually sung separately makes it possible, of course, to regard them as 

 two distinct songs. 2 



Though the songs of the three species differ, their call-notes 

 are much alike, a soft, plaintive "hweet," which I have certainly heard 

 used as an alarm-note by the willow-wren, and which according to 

 Naumann is equally so used by the wood-wren. The latter has in 

 addition a note syllabled by Mr. Jourdain as " tee, tee," used by the hen 

 as an alarm-note corresponding to the " whoo-it " of the willow- wren. 

 To this "whoo-it" the latter occasionally adds the "hweet," making 

 " whoo-it, whoo-it, hweet, whoo-it," interpreted by Mr. Jourdain as " There 

 is danger about. There is danger about. Where are you, my dear ? 

 There is danger about." The wood- wren also adds the "hweet" in the 



1 F. C. R Jourdain (in lift.). 2 British Birds, ii. p. 226 (H. W. Mapleton). 



